


and tread once more familiar paths

by xpityx



Category: Black Sails
Genre: Alternate Universe - Reincarnation, F/F
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-02-20
Updated: 2019-02-20
Packaged: 2019-10-28 11:48:34
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 690
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/17786810
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/xpityx/pseuds/xpityx
Summary: They never remember until near the end.





	and tread once more familiar paths

**Author's Note:**

  * For [SlumberousTrash](https://archiveofourown.org/users/SlumberousTrash/gifts).



> Happy Birthday to my babe, my beta and partner in fandom-related crimes [SlumberousTrash](https://archiveofourown.org/users/SlumberousTrash). This is as close as I could get to a Soulmate AU - hope you like it xx

 

They never remember until near the end. One of them gasping for breath, bleeding out, will say _I know you, I always knew you_ , and like magic the other will remember. Reach out a hand, warm with blood or cooling fast, and it is all there for them to see: all the lives they had lived, all the ends they had seen.

 

This time, however, Anne knows the second she sees Max. Anne is in a strip club, her boss’ drunk birthday request. Max is on stage, her yellow bikini electric against her skin and her body pulsing to the heavy bass. She catches sight of Anne and misses a step, but in a second she is back facing the crowd with a practiced smile. She’s distant as she collects her tips from the stage, her lack of flirtation causing even more money to be thrown at her feet, men begging for a smile, for a wink. She takes their money and strides off. Anne waits for her by the door, but doesn’t wait long.

 

They talk about what it means over the years, the fact that Anne remembers the feel of a ship beneath her feet and a noose around her neck. She remembers Jerusalem and a journey across the sea, carrying the words of a god she had never believed in. Or that Max remembers the tributes brought to her in a dry, hot country, half-familiar words of power on her tongue. She remembers weapons in her hands and the way her children had played at her feet.

 

It makes the paths they walk more wondrous: the lights and the movies, the medicine and the comfort. They talk about visiting some of the places they had lived before when they are younger, about the books they could write and the movies they could make. But they go instead to places they have no memories of: to Lyon and Tokyo, London and Montréal, and are all the more pleased with their home when they arrive back again.

 

They have more time than they have ever had before. Max survives breast cancer, and Anne’s broken leg heals without so much as a limp. Neither of them have any family, Anne had come through the foster system and Max was brought up by a beloved grandmother who died when she was still a freshman in college. They go together to visit her grave when they can: Max tells her about her life now and Anne sings sea shanties under her breath.

 

Where they live there’s a lake that’s cold even in mid-summer, but Anne loves to swim. Even when her hair is more silver than red and her step a little less sure she feels at home in the water, wading out until it laps at her breasts. Max makes her wear a wetsuit, though the floats are promptly stabbed and deflated. Max is supposed to be retired, but she can still be found typing away at her laptop most evenings, code unspooling under her clever fingers.

 

They watch bad movies and they dance, they walk in the crisp mountain air and argue about who is going to drive down to the store—Anne is the more skilled driver. Is their life better, more full, knowing they have lived before, that they have loved before, Max wonders aloud. Anne doesn’t know, doesn’t much care for the philosophy of it. They will live again or they won’t, they will see each other again or they won’t.

 

All she knows is this: a snowflake falls and lays suspended in Max’s hair and the moment before it melts is endless.

  


 

_At times I almost dream_

_I too have spent a life the sages’ way,_

_And tread once more familiar paths. Perchance_

_I perished in an arrogant self-reliance_

_Ages ago; and in that act a prayer_

_For one more chance went up so earnest, so_

_Instinct with better light let in by death,_

_That life was blotted out — not so completely_

_But scattered wrecks enough of it remain,_

_Dim memories, as now, when once more seems_

_The goal in sight again._

Robert Browning — 'Paracelsus' [excerpt] _  
_

 

**Author's Note:**

> Beta'd by Kit and [urcadelimabean](https://archiveofourown.org/users/urcadelimabean/pseuds/urcadelimabean) <3
> 
> If anyone is interested I'm taking part in [Fandom Trumps Hate](https://fth2019offerings.dreamwidth.org/86943.html) this year (in any fandom) - all monies going to good causes.


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